Week 2 -- Portraits of my sister Carrie

These are my favorites and I love putting portaits into a collage. 

This is what I did and learned.  First, I used my Nikon D40 with the 55-200mm lens that came with my camera.  We started indoors with a black backdrop.  1/125s, f4.5, ISO800

I cropped it just slightly and darkened the shadows to make the black blacker. 

Then we went outside.  Here is a shot I love SOOC -- and then edited -- it needed warming up 1/640s f5.6 ISO 400

Then Keri suggested changing my white balance to shade since the photos were looking a little blue.  Here are 2 similar shots -- one has the white balance on auto and one on shade.

1/500s f5.0 ISO400 WB auto

1/500s f 9.0 ISO 1600 WB shade

So I have mixed feelings -- it is definately warmer with the white balance -- but I think it is too warm.  As I reviewed the photo data I noticed that my ISO was at 1600.  That has me wondering if I had left it set there from a previous photo setting, and therefore this is a skewed WB shade example or if it was in Auto ISO and to accomodate the shade it upped the ISO???  I guess I'll never know, but I will definately try harder to check all my settings next time.  In the editing after it seems easier to warm up a photo, but trickier to tone it down a little.  I guess this means I need to focus on custom white balance because as you can see, it makes a huge difference, but using the presets may not always be the best route.